


Enter the Storm

by Tibbins



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Angry Castiel (Supernatural), Episode: s13e05 Advanced Thanatology, Implied/Referenced Suicide, M/M, Self-Destructive Dean
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-27
Updated: 2017-11-27
Packaged: 2019-02-07 15:50:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,122
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12844443
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tibbins/pseuds/Tibbins
Summary: A few days after 13x05, Cas finds out about Dean's attempt on his own life. Destiel.





	Enter the Storm

**Author's Note:**

> So this prompt was posed to me by The muse of fan fiction on ffn.net and I thought it would be interesting to oblige. Although my other story 'The Win' was similar, I thought I could try a different angle and see what happened. This is the result.
> 
> Enjoy ^_^

Dean shook out the trash bag and began the process of cleaning his room. Namely, erasing the evidence of his drinking habits before Cas wandered in without knocking as he was often wont to do. He picked up three bottles by the necks and tossed them into the bag, judging by the sound, at least one of them cracked. While he was cleaning he might as well empty his actual bin of useless bits of paper and a couple of faulty bullets. He bent to tip the bin upside down into the bag, that might cushion the impact of at least some of the other bottles at least. He asked himself again why he should care. It's not like Cas didn't  _know_  that he drank a lot, he had commented on the habit more than once. Except, Dean had never been embarrassed by it before. Looking around, he saw the tell-tale brown glass glinting from almost every surface, bottle caps strewn around the floor like pebbles on a beach, and even a few new stains on the carpet that Dean couldn't remember making. He rubbed a hand across the back of his neck. He knew he'd overdone it, even by his standards. But Cas was back now, so the bottles needed to go. Preferably while both Cas and Sam were distracted with Jack in the library, so they'd miss his walk of shame to the dumpster. The largest pile of bottles was next to the bed, where he'd dumped them after sucking them dry. Dean shook his head as he began to shove the bottles, two at a time into the bag. Once that pile was taken care of, Dean grabbed a torch and shone it under the bed, there were at least a dozen bottles and twice as many bottle caps down there. He sighed and began the slow, arduous process of plucking the caps from the carpet, some of them snagged and he hit his head on the bed frame more than once.

Once he'd cleaned out the underside of his bed, excluding of course the spare gun taped to the metal frame and the jar of holy water, he wriggled back out and tugged on the bag experimentally. It was heavy. Heavier than it should be really. At the time, Dean hadn't really realised how much he'd been drinking, but looking at the size and weight of the bag in front of him, he was overcome by shame and not a little frustration. Sammy had seen this. His brother had brought up his drinking fairly consistently over the past few weeks, but Dean had dismissed it as background nagging. Nothing worth listening to. Their job didn't exactly allow for a life span that would  _let_  him die of liver failure so what was the point in worrying?  _But you'd think_ , he thought, frowning at the full bag,  _that this much alcohol would have helped, even a little._  It hadn't of course. It never did. Sometimes he could kid himself that it did. At the very least it would make him forget a few hours of feeling like crap and sometimes that was all he wanted. He tied the top of the bag together and surveyed his now clean half of his room, nodding to himself. Back to normal, the way things should be. He reached for another trash bag.

In that moment, a tempest crashed through his door, throwing him back so his spine slammed into the wall behind him. He had an arm applying pressure at his throat and two, boiling oceans obscuring his vision.

"Exactly what part-" the storm growled, "-of me invoking cosmic consequences by killing a reaper was  _unclear_?"

"Cas, what-?" Dean managed to choke out. But he was interrupted,

"Because I  _thought_  that I had accompanied this action with the words 'I won't let you die', which, even out of context, pretty much explained my feelings on the situation."

Dean just made a strangled sort of gasping noise in response. The angel lessened the hold slightly, allowing for Dean to actually breathe, but his eyes didn't soften,

"So imagine my surprise," the angel's deep voice was a low snarl, like rocks in a blender, "when I find out that you decided to take matters into your own hands."

"What are you talking about?" Dean spluttered, head spinning,

Castiel's eyes flared once more and his hold tightened again for a split second. Dean's legs dangled uselessly off the floor, his hands gripped at the arm on his throat, he knew it would be pointless trying to pry it off. He tried anyway, his fingers scrabbling at the sleeve of the new trenchcoat while Castiel pressed against him, radiating waves of fury,

"I'm talking about  _you_ , Dean. I'm talking about you stopping your heart with a needle and leaving your brother alone in a house full of pissed off ghosts. I'm talking about your  _suicide attempt_ , does that ring a bell at all?"

Dean looked away, he couldn't help it, those eyes bored into him, they saw more than they had any right to, more than should be possible.

The angel stepped back and let Dean drop, his legs crumpled underneath him. He looked up to see Castiel run a hand through his hair, eyes wild and pained. Then he looked down at Dean and the anger seemed to dissipate as quickly as a cloud. He sighed and knelt. Dean shuffled back, half-heartedly pushing himself higher up the wall.

"Cas," he said, "it wasn't-"

"It  _was_." Castiel took hold of the front of Dean's shirt in one hand and forced him to meet his eyes, "don't lie to me, Dean. Even if you somehow think I don't know you that well, you'd better believe that Sam does."

"Sam's  _wrong_ ," he protested, batting away Cas' hand. The angel let go and sat back on his heels. The anger had been replaced with something more subtle, frustration and pain and confusion and sadness, Dean couldn't look for long,

Castiel glanced over his shoulder at the trash bag, which had split and was leaking brown glass onto the floor, and then scan the rest of his room, where bottles and caps still littered the desk and the door to the bathroom. Dean saw the angel's face tighten.

"And this?" he asked, gesturing to the bag, "was this another suicide attempt? Trying to induce multiple organ failure?"

"We had a  _kid_  to save Cas, and we were on the clock. What was I supposed to do?"

"The phrase 'not killing yourself' comes to mind," Cas said, though the fire was gone from his words. He sighed, and pressed his lips together, the tip of his tongue darting out to wet them.

"Dean," he said, staring intently into Dean's own eyes, his voice gentle and calming, his eyes open, wanting to understand, "you can't lie to me. I just don't understand why you would do something like that for such a simple matter of angry ghosts."

The expression on the angel's face and the softness of the request broke Dean's resolve. Now that he had met Cas' eyes, he found himself unable to look away, those eyes were pleading with him, asking for answers and promising forgiveness. Forgiveness that he didn't deserve.

"I-" he said, even forcing that word out was hard, it stuck in his throat like a toothpick. "I just wanted an out."

Cas said nothing, he just stared at him, holding his eyes,

"I was done, man. I was just done pretending that what I did meant something. That we helped more than we hurt. But losing mom, losing  _you_ , that crap just didn't add up anymore. It's because of me all this even started. If I had just held out in Hell, Lucifer never would have risen, the whole apocalypse thing would have been avoided. Hundreds of people, maybe  _thousands_  have died because I wasn't strong enough. And I keep failing. I keep losing. So why do I even bother fighting? If I just took myself out, I could be gone and I couldn't screw anything else up. I couldn't break the first seal or give in to the Mark of Cain or set Amara free."

Something flickered in the angel's eyes at that but he still didn't speak, didn't move. He just held Dean's eyes.

"I watched you die, Cas," Dean said, remembering the way that the light of his grace had bled from him, the way that Dean had screamed his denial, the wings scorched in earth. "I prayed to Chuck to bring you back. But of course that didn't work so I burned your body and I said goodbye. But I just… I didn't know how to be anymore, you know? I was a major dick to Jack and I wouldn't listen to Sam 'cause he kept telling me we'd been here before. And he wasn't wrong, he shouldn't have been  _wrong_. But it was different, I don't know why, and I just stopped swinging. I couldn't take the hit, so I got out of the ring."

"But it didn't work."

Dean huffed out a laugh, though there was no humour in it. "No, Billie didn't care what I wanted. So it doesn't even matter." He steeled his expression into defiance, "so you can be pissed at me, but it won't change what I did and it won't make me feel any less like crap. I know what I did to Sam. And what it would have done to you to come back and find that I-" he stopped, swallowing the words, "so beat me up if it's gonna make you feel better, yell at me, toss me around, whatever. You've earned that right, after everything, you've  _earned_  that."

"Pissed at you?" Cas tilted his head and reached one hand to brush away the tear trailing down Dean's cheek. "Dean, I'm not pissed, I'm  _sorry_."

Dean blinked, confused, he'd expected more yelling.

"I'm sorry that you felt that way, I'm sorry I couldn't be there to help you through it, I'm sorry I didn't  _ask_  how you'd been. I'm sorry I heard it from Sam first. But you seemed so  _happy_ , so normal and I thought,  _hoped_ , maybe it hadn't affected you as much as I'd thought it would."

"I-"

Cas helped him to his feet and pressed two fingers to his temple, healing the bruise on his back from hitting the wall and probably any damage he'd managed to do to his liver. Dean was overwhelmed. He felt like a fishing boat in the eye of a storm, and no matter which way he turned, he'd end up drowning anyway. He gripped the angel's lapel, noting the surprise as Cas looked down, but Dean just stared at his own hand. He could feel the light thrum of grace under the surface of Cas' chest, the heartbeat of an angel.

"Turns out I need you, Cas." Dean breathed.

Cas' lips tilted upwards, just a little.

"You have me," he said, Dean nodded and let that knowledge wrap around him. Cas was home. Everything was better.

The angel placed a warm hand on the back of Dean's neck and gently leaned forward so that their foreheads pressed together, eyes shut tight. It was warm and comforting, their breath mingled and their noses touched. They stayed like that for what could have been seconds or hours, but however much time had passed it was too damn long and nowhere near long enough.

Finally, Dean steeled himself, and he lifted his chin to place a soft kiss to the corner of Cas' mouth. The angel drew back, surprised, and blinked, Dean wilted and began to pull away,  _stupid_  he berated himself,  _why would you do that?_  until Cas stopped him, pressing their lips together once more, the kiss said everything that couldn't or didn't need to be expressed in words. It was a promise and a confirmation, a confession and an apology, it was forgiveness and frustration and every missed opportunity. Cas' hands slid up Dean's chest, grabbing at his shirt to pull them closer together, one of Dean's hands tangled in the angel's hair, the other cupped his cheek as though to hold him there, to  _feel_  that this was for real. The dam building inside of him for so long broke, and he allowed himself to follow the current. Holding Cas, inhaling his scent, saltwater and lightning, it was like holding a storm, enveloped in passion and power and strength. And for the first time in his life, as the angel broke the kiss to whisper words into his ear, words he himself had wanted to say for so long. Dean Winchester felt truly invincible.

**Author's Note:**

> So what do you think?  
> I hope the ending isn't too cheesy/out of character.  
> It was really fun to re-write this situation because although I stick by the reactions shown in 'The Win', this one feels just as likely (imo anyway, perhaps without the make out session at the end).  
> I think it's also fair to warn you that real life is going to catch up with me soon. I need to move into my own flat and start my new job so I will have much less time to write in a few weeks. I'll try and write as much as I can, these past few weeks have been amazing with so much awesome feedback so I'll try and keep at least a little of that going.
> 
> Love Tibbins xx


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